A mistake Winston says, but MP stands by his words

A mistake? It was a column! He wrote it. He says he stands by what he said. How can you claim it is a mistake!

He said he knew about the article three weeks ago, and told Prosser it wasn’t acceptable to present only one side of the argument.

“I’ve told him he cannot have a view that doesn’t have the balance in the other side of the argument.”

You think the lack of balance was the issue Winston? Not calling people wogs and saying people who look like wogs shouldn’t be allowed on planes? The issue wasn’t balance. Columns are not meant to be balanced. They are meant though not to be racist.

Prosser wrote the column as a journalist, not as a NZ First MP, and the views expressed were not those of the party, Peters said.

Are you serious? He wrote it as a journalist, not as an MP? That’s your excuse for doing nothing.

He said a press statement was imminent from Prosser – but the MP had said he stood by his comments.

Barry Soper reported that Prosser had said he stands by his comments.

Trade Negotiations Minister Tim Groser is technically Muslim (as he married a Muslim). If he was a bit younger, then according to Prosser he should be banned from flying on Western airlines.

Many interesting, outraged and humourous comments on Twitter under the Wogistan hashtag.

NZ First leader Winston Peters says there is an ‘element of truth’ in the column and he has not asked Mr Prosser to apologise.

Incredible.

The PM has said:

Prime Minister John Key said Mr Prosser’s comments were “an example of the depth of thinking coming out of New Zealand First”.

“It’s an appalling thing to say. It was premeditated. It was written in an opinion piece. It’s clearly what New Zealand First think of other New Zealanders but it’s a bit buffoonish if you ask me.”

And others:

Asked whether the NZ First MP should have kept his comments to himself, Mr Harawira said: “It’s best that they’re actually expressed openly because when people hold views as extreme as that it’s best that we hear them.”

I agree. It’s good to know that at least one NZ First MP things wogs shouldn’t be allowed on planes.

Act Party leader John Banks said the comments were “crazy” and “bizarre”.

“What can you say? I believe in good in all people, all races, all people.”

Asked whether there was a place for such extreme views in Parliament, Mr Banks said: “That is going to be tested by this member.”

United Future leader Peter Dunne also criticised the remarks on Twitter.

“It all reveals an ugly racist seam lurks just below the skin of too many people here – very uncomfortable,” he wrote.

We often call things racist too often. But in this case it is hard not to conclude it is racism when he writes of Wogistan and banning from travel anyone who “looks Muslim”.

The big question loomings:
– will NZ First survive the next election?
– if so will they be in a balance of power position?
– if so would any of National, Labour and Greens consider being in coalition with NZ First?

Parties should just about be rulling and possible coalitions out already.

Manolo

mikemikemikemike

Is that the same John Banks who was trying to get the Nth Shore residents to vote for him by saying if they didn’t they risked their lovely suburbs becoming bro-town, more and more like Sth Auckland? – Spare me. Religious people always preach acceptance and forgiveness while being the most judgmental and merciless. Muslims are the worst of a bad bunch.

I didn’t type that very carefully. Parties should just about be ruling any possible coalitions out already.

I don’t know if UF has any current position on possible coalitions, but it’s a different situation for small parties.

If National or Labour were forming a coalition with NZF holding the balance of power unless including UF in the coalition provided another majority option then I may support that. But not in a coalition where NZF held the balance of power alone or with Greens.

GPT1

Winston knows there’s votes in racism. Especially kicking Muslims. Appalling piece – only good thing about it is that the fact he was not arrested (ahem UK) shows the strength of our freedom of speech.

Viking2

Oh dear, apparently freedom to speak your mind is about to be declared all kinds of things including probably illegal. Just like England, France et al.
All tp appease the hand wringing soft cocks and politicans whose sight is so bad that they cannot see or read about the truth of the world.

NZ First Leader Winston Peters said there was “an element of truth’ to what Mr Prosser wrote, but his MP had failed to balance his attack by acknowledging that the majority of Muslims were peaceful and law abiding.

“There is an element of truth to what he is saying … this has been happening again and again … there are far too many Moslem extremists”, Mr Peters said.

However, Mr Peters said: “You cannot have a view that puts everybody in the same boat when we know that there are Islamic governments abroad and millions and millions of Islamic people who are law abiding and peaceful and democratic. That’s where the article dramatically failed.

“NZ First does not share that view, and you’ll not be hearing it repeated again.”

RRM

TimG_Oz – I don’t know who or what you’re referring to. I know there was one candidate who was an embarrassment but I presume the person you’re accusing didn’t get anywhere near parliament. Just sayin…

thor42

Yes, I certainly *hope* that the freedom to speak one’s mind is never made illegal here, Viking2.

The stupid politically-correct “offensive speech” laws in the UK and Europe are only *ever* used to silence those who *validly* criticise Islam (like Geert Wilders – ok, he got off, fortunately). You *never* see Muslims hauled into court under those laws for waving around signs saying “God bless Hitler”.

Muslims are a “protected species” under the loony-PC laws of the UK and Europe. They can do whatever they like – they almost never get prosecuted.

RRM

RRM

You have to remember Winston’s base is in the retirement home. Where would we be without Winston?

I suspect part of the code that you sign up to when you become a foot soldier for Winston Peters is that you accept that the chief might shoulder tap you for a suicide mission at any time.

Brendan Horan looks like he might have ripped off his poor dear old mother’s bank account –> Winston sacks Horan –> Winston’s a principled hero –> Where would we be without Winston?

Richard Prosser makes some loose comments about all Muslim men look like terrorists from Wogistan –> oldies from an era when casual racism was more widespread nod and agree –> Where would we be without Winston?

(And if it backfires, Winston could always distance himself and sack Prosser… again, Winston’s a principled hero –> Where would we be without Winston? )

Tauhei Notts

thor 42 just because muslims behave like arseholes and are a protected species it doesn’t mean we have to tolerate rubbish this from a fuck wit like prosser. he is a mp not some half pissed idiot in a public bar, then again he might be I don’t know his drinking habits

RRM

barry

I suspect all that prosser has said is what a majority of people think— but are too frightened to say.

Theres nothing particularly likeable about many muslims from the way they behave, the way they treat women, the stupid beliefs they have (21 virgins waiting for them in heaven and all that sort of shit) etc.

Reg

I wouldn’t be suprised if this is a calculated political move. NZ First appeals to person that think -even if they don’t speak -like Prosser. My guess is the next poll will seem them rise. Winston actions prove this. He asks for balance but doesn’t condemn the racist allegations, in effect keeping trying to appear reasonable yet keeping his constituency happy.

Bob R

It’s a shame that they couldn’t get someone more articulate and urbane like novelist Paul Auster’s cousin, Lawrence:

“To deal with the crisis facing our civilization, we must be both realistic and imaginative. The realism part consists in recognizing how bad our situation is. The entire Western world is at present under the grip of the modern liberal ideology that targets every normal and familiar aspect of human life, and our entire historical way of being as a society.

The key to this liberal ideology is the belief in tolerance or non-discrimination as the ruling principle of society, the principle to which all other principles must yield. We see this belief at work in every area of modern life. The principle of non-discrimination must, if followed consistently, destroy every human society and institution. A society that cannot discriminate between itself and other societies will go out of existence, just as an elm tree that cannot discriminate between itself and a linden tree must go out of existence. To be, we must be able to say that we are us, which means that we are different from others. If we are not allowed to distinguish between ourselves and Muslims, if we must open ourselves to everyone and everything in the world that is different from us, and if the more different and threatening the Other is, the more we must open ourselves to it, then we go out of existence…

What would have been inconceivable 70 or 80 years ago is unquestionable today. A society that 70 years ago wouldn’t have dreamed of admitting large numbers of Muslims, today doesn’t dream of reducing, let alone stopping, the immigration of Muslims. Even the most impassioned anti-Islamic Cassandras never question—indeed they never even mention—the immigration of Muslims, or say it should be reduced or stopped…

The dilemma suggests the solution. What is now unthinkable, must become thinkable; what is now unsayable, must become sayable; and ultimately it must replace non-discrimination as the ruling belief in society. I know that this sounds crazy, utterly impossible. But fifty or a hundred years ago it would have seemed crazy, utterly impossible, that today’s liberalism with its suicidal ideology would have replaced the traditional attitudes that were then prevalent. If society could change that radically in one direction, toward suicidal liberalism, it can change back again. It’s not impossible.”

Bazar

Ryan Sproull (5,390) Says:
February 12th, 2013 at 3:24 pm
>>Muslims blow innocent people up and subjugate women, they deserve a bit of stick.

>Except for the ones that don’t.

The Muslims that don’t personally do so, still believe in a religion that supports and encourages such actions.
Islam is an uncompromising and hostile religion, which the world would be better off without.

itstricky

David Garrett

I actually think the conspiracy theorists (it’s all a cunning plan by Winston) might have something here…

During my time in parliament, I wrote a weekly column for the “Truth”. Before being sent in, they had to be vetted by our chief of staff. Occasionally he would make “suggestions” about possible changes, and we would discuss them. Once or twice, I was told to omit a word or phrase. Being a loyal foot soldier/backbencher, I always did so.

Now, presumably Winnie set up something similar for this guy…in which case the conspiracy theorists might be right, and this fellow Prosser is taking the flack for something Winnie is actually quite happy to have associated with NZ First. Then of course it may be that they are just a bunch of incompetents without any internal discipline…in which case I look forward to Andrew Williams bursting into print late one night…That should be good.

adc

Chuck Bird

You are probably right David. I wonder if some journalist will ask Winston when he was first aware of the article in Investigate?

Mind you I am not fond of paedophiles even dead ones. We have 41,000 paedophile worshipers and with 750 refuges mostly Muslims and their families we will soon reach 1% and in a few years 2%. Harriet has a very good point. It is a worry.

Incidentally, Islam is a religion not a race and people at least in the West are free to reject their religion at least till the percentage gets too high.

Dexter

The stupid politically-correct “offensive speech” laws in the UK and Europe are only *ever* used to silence those who *validly* criticise Islam (like Geert Wilders – ok, he got off, fortunately). You *never* see Muslims hauled into court under those laws for waving around signs saying “God bless Hitler”.

Muslim extremists are often prosecuted using those exact same laws, you would know this if your world view and knowledge wasn’t limited to what you read in the Daily Mail.

Bob R

@ bc,

The irony is that if anyone should be concerned about immigration in particular from islamic countries it is liberals.

But let’s look at the views of Muslims in Western Europe toward homosexuals:

As you can see, Western European Muslims are much more conservative than the general population. Or, more accurately they’re much more reactionary and culturally alien. The reality is that the status quo in Western Europe is toward acceptance of homosexuality without the sort of debates we have in the United States. Interestingly you can’t even calculate a real ratio for British Muslims to the general public, not one British Muslim surveyed would admit to homosexuality being morally acceptable.”

Rodders

duggledog

See the MSM spluttering indignantly about this (and giving it maximum oxygen) – especially Alison Mau right now who’s freaking the shit out of herself while Wishart’s circulation increases

If you think Prosser’s views aren’t widely agreed with in New Zealand you don’t know the fabric of your own country and you need to get out to the ‘burbs and the provinces more. Let’s get some of these useless journalists off their i phones and down to Nelson, Christchurch, Dunedin, Invercargill, Gore, Palmy I could go on, find some recently arrived Mussies and ask them if they’ve experienced any hassles

Personally I think Prosser is a twat and a boor and a buffoon and would tell forward shit jokes via email. I see a very short career for him in politics like the nob end straight out of TVNZ HR, but for better or worse I believe his views are wiiiidespread

mara

Perhaps I missed it but Islam is not a race. It is a belief system that is determined to overcome the West. Prosser knows this and said as much in a Conservative Magazine. What was wrong with that? Offended? So what?

hj

John Key would like to paint a vote for NZ First as a racist vote. However:

John Carran, 2 April 1996

“Vehement opposition to immigration, particularly from Asian countries, in New Zealand from an ill-informed and xenophobic rabble persists despite overwhelming evidence that immigration will improve our long term economic prospects.

In 1988 The Institute of Policy Studies published detailed research by Jacques Poot, Ganesh Nana and Bryan Philpott on the effects of migration on the New Zealand economy. The research, which abstracted from the social and environmental impact of immigration, concluded that “…a significant migration inflow can be beneficial to the performance of the New Zealand economy and subsequent consumption and income levels.” The authors point out that this is in general agreement with Australian research on the economic consequences of immigration.

–
–
Of course there is more to life than attaining economic excellence. The social and environmental impact of immigration also needs to be considered. But here the reasons given for restricting immigration range from pathetic to extremely dodgy. Most of the accusations are barely disguised racist piffle backed by tenuous rumours and cloudy anecdotes. Winston Peters’ stirring of the masses has exposed the ignorance and racial biases of a small and distasteful section of New Zealand society. These people yearn for a cloistered, inhibited, white (with a bit of brown at the edges) dominated utopia fondly envisaged by racists and xenophobes everywhere.
”http://www.gmi.co.nz/news/1021/opposition-to-immigration-why-let-the-arguments-get-in-the-way.aspx

Savings Working Group
January 2011

“The big adverse gap in productivity between New Zealand and other countries opened up from the 1970s to the early 1990s. The policy choice that increased immigration – given the number of employers increasingly unable to pay First-World wages to the existing population and all the capital requirements that increasing populations involve – looks likely to have worked almost directly against the adjustment New Zealand needed to make and it might have been better off with a lower rate of net immigration. This adjustment would have involved a lower real interest rate (and cost of capital) and a lower real exchange rate, meaning a more favourable environment for raising the low level of productive capital per worker and labour productivity. The low level of capital per worker is a striking symptom of New Zealand’s economic challenge.
”http://www.treasury.govt.nz/publications/reviews-consultation/savingsworkinggroup/pdfs/swg-report-jan11.pdf

Viking2

Confused Kiwis can’t handle the truth
Posted on February 12, 2013 by KG

‘Comments on Muslims by New Zealand First MP Richard Prosser have sparked online outrage and have been slammed as racist by a Muslim leader.
The “muslim leader” needs to get an education–an ideology is not a race.

duggie

I have recently returned to NZ. According to Wikipedia NZ First got 6.59% of the vote which entitles them to eight seats in Parliament. Did any of these people actually win a seat? How did things come to this where eight nutbars get to be MP’s with such a tiny minority of support? Someone please explain.

David Garrett

PG: While I dont resile at all from what I said earlier about this guy, I also strongly believe that you and others are extremely naive if you think we won’t get serious problems if he we allow more Muslim immigration here…Everywhere Muslims have gained a significant toehold as a percentage of the population, there have been serious problems. We have an example right over the ditch in Oz…what makes you think it would be any different here if Muslims were – say – 8% of the population rather than 1 or 2 or whatever they are now?

Do we really want suburbs of Auckland where New Zealand women dare not go unless they are in a bloody chador or a burka? I dont….

Well said. While I do not agree with the comments of that idiot Prosser (seriously, did Winston even know these other people before the met them in Parliament?) I also do not want mass Muslim immigration into NZ.

Yvette

Winston – He said he knew about the article three weeks ago, and told Prosser it wasn’t acceptable to present only one side of the argument.

Peters acknowledged he had known about the claims for two months.
Peters today denied he had put Horan on leave.
“He’s doing all his constituency work, he’s doing all his correspondence, he’s not on tour leave or beach leave or gardening leave. He’s getting on with his job, but that is his number one priority.”

David Garrett

DG, currently less than 1%. No sign of it getting anywhere near 8%. So whether or not there’s a tipping point % or not (highly debatable in New Zealand, nothing to prove that it would happen) we aren’t anywhere near that and don’t look like getting there.

I simply don’t see that there is any tangible problem. There is certainly no plan of or sign of mass Muslim immigration here.

David Garrett

PG: Jeez, I actually credited you with a few clues! Try and answer my question Peter…just to make it clear, I will put it in quotes: “If we ever got the same % of Muslims in NZ as are currently part of the Australian population, what makes you think we wouldn’t get exactly the same problems that country is experiencing?”

Is that clear enough?

I will give you my answer: It would actually be a bloody sight worse here because of how tolerant we all are of “diversity”, including being totally comfortable with not one but TWO blatantly racist parties in our parliament…granted one of them has about as much support as your mate….

Tom Jackson

DG:
1. There is currently no sign of any problem here
2, New Zealand is a lot smaller than Australia.
3. There is no sign of us getting close to the numbers you are talking about.
4. If we are tolerant of diversity it is just as likely Muslims would feel accepted and unthreatened, therefore safe and unreactionary.
5. There has been fearmongering of immigrant groups in the past that has come to nothing.

In fifty years I hope most Muslims will have learnt off the remaining moderate Christians and see their religion as a personal faith integrated with the rest of society rather than an obsession dictated by power seeking/clinging patriarchs.

do you think there was almost certainly “no sign of any problem” in Australia 25 years ago?

I don’t know, I haven’t been following what’s been happening there, and have only occasionally heard of problems even now. Are Muslims any worse than other groups? For example, are they involved in the bikie gangs or other organised crime groups?

How would our being smaller make a blind bit of difference?

In the modern world larger metropolitan areas seem to have the biggest problem with gangs and ethnic groupings causing problems. We have smaller and fewer large cities, therefore less risk.

Reid

Muslim immigration is being used as a vehicle to promote conflict. Unless and until you understand that you will understand nothing about Muslim immigration.

People like Prosser are merely the useful idiots in this equation playing right into the hands of the evil ones promoting this. And like all useful idiots he doesn’t even know he’s being played.

It’s not as obvious here as it is in the EU or North America. This is because both we and Aus are mere bit players in this global game. The architects don’t don’t particularly care about us at the bottom of the world, because they know we’ll just follow the trend, as we always have done, a few years after the big players.

As always, the answer is to recognise what’s going on. Part of that is recognising who Muslims really are, which is not the same thing as the picture we get from those who wish to propagate their evil poisonous and false message.

Jack5

Quite a few posters in the Kiwiblog threads today have attacked Prosser for being “racist” but then revealed themselves as intolerant. It raises the question whether you can class yourself as unprejudiced if you are prejudiced against prejudiced people?

Consider Pauleastbay’s post at 4.18pm:

Richard Prosser is from Christchurch. His people expect this sort of comment.

Pauleastbay must know Prosser is a list MP, and thus reveals his own prejudice (against Christchurch people). He has a bit in common with Prosser.

And I’m not counting Pauleastbay’s 18th November post:

I have submitted a private members bill that will ban all ginga’s from beaches, rivers and Queen Street.

Campbell on TV3 tonight was almost bursting a blood vessel with his righteous anger at Prosser. Campbell brings some reasonable programmes at times, but he comes across as so self-righteous on liberal issues like Prosser’s column and on things such as the poor.

Anyone recall Campbell’s early-days interview with General Chuck Yeager, who featured in Tom Wolfe’s book about astronauts The Right Stuff and the subsequent film? Part of the Campbell-Yeager interview was along these lines. Campbell asked in his usual, heavily dramatic style: “How DOO you KNOW if someone has the RIGHT STUFF?”

I am not sure why people are so shocked and outraged. This is NZ First – they appeal to the basest bottom-feeders of the NZ electorate, and they elect a pack of herpderps every parliament, because that’s what representative democracy entails. Complaining about it is like complaining about the weather.

I’ve been noticing for a while now that people that go on random mass shooting rampages are usually white males.
So following Prosser’s “logic”, all white males should be banned from owning guns.

Actually, they’re all registered Democrats. I think if we stuck to banning Democrats from owning guns, we’d be golden.

This Prosser chap really is a bit dim. If he wanted to get away with writing things like this then all he needed to say was that he did not like Muslim motherfuckers and that he would not want his kids to marry one of them.

I remember some years ago meeting a delightful muslim couple. While in the kitchen, my wife showed the mother what a dish cloth was and how it worked. She thought it was a novel and marvelous invention.

This couple had been in that western country for over 10 years and had not learned what a dish cloth was.

In my mind this opitimised the problem with Islam. By and large, they don’t integrate with the western society because it is so different to their own. And of course because they have not been affected by womans liberation they tend to have quite large families.

I believe it was Colonal Ghadaffi who boasted the Muslims would conquer Europe without firing a single shot. I agree with him and am not too optimistic about the outcome.

I don’t mind Prossers comments. I’m well and truely sick of the thought police telling me what I can think in spite of the evidence. I think it is quite telling that not many have found fault with the general accuracy of his comments, they are just not nice things to say (which is very true),

My father was a chronic alcoholic. The first thing Al Anon made him do was to admit he had a problem. Until then they said there was nothing they could do to help. There’s some relevance to this debate in that I think.

deadrightkev

How pathetic and what a bunch of softcocks. No wonder this country is rooted with the likes of marxists Key and Shearer as helmsmen (a loose term).

I would never dream of voting for Winston First because he is a crook but anyone that doesnt accept that muslims have been responsible for most of the bomb related terrorism in the world is mentally retarded. How hard has the muslim world tried to rein in their extremist cells? Not very hard from where I am sitting.

We need more outspoken Prossers to rid the country of the hopeless bland leading the bland we have now.

hj

The Governments own Savings Working Group affirmed NZ Firsts position on the Labour Parties policies of mass migration. That’s (another) inconvienient truth.
How about Radio NZ, Cambell Live Young National One, discussing that?

David Garrett

BB at 5.40 has nailed it, and highlighted exactly why any serious Muslim immigration here would be a disaster. We would have what Winnie used to call – highly ironic in these circumstances – “sickly white liberals” excusing Muslims demands for larger state houses so the women could live at one end; segregated swimming pools so the women wouldn’t have to mix with men; the “right” to shroud their women in Burkas and chadors; the “right” to have extreme clerics preaching death to the infidels. All of which is happening in Oz right now. Today.

Chuck Bird

David Garrett

PG: How do you think it STARTED in Oz Pete? All of that shit didn’t start happening one Thursday in May…We have already had demands here by Somali Muslims for six bedroom state houses so the women could be separated, and “Muslim women only” times at local swimming pools…pick up Newspapers (sorry this is 2013, do a google search) from Oz 25 years ago and you can bet your ass it would have started there in just the same way….before there was enough of them to really make an impact. Those who do not learn from history are destined to repeat it.

NZ is 0.9% Muslim now. What do you predict it will be in 10 years time?

I have no idea – do you know of statistics that indicate what it could be?

As far as I’m aware our immigration selection criteria does not include or exclude based on religion. I don’t think we have a Muslim quota, nor a Jew quota, a Christian quota or an Atheist quota.

“Muslim women only” times at local swimming pools

They have pool and time restrictions for children, they have pensioner sessions, lane swimming sessions, diving restrictions, swimming club use, competitions with school and age and sex restrictions. In fact all competitions that I’ve never been able to participate in because I’m a crap swimmer.

DPF retweeted this so may post on it but I think it’s worth quoting a big chunk of this blog post by Diane Revoluta:

Here, my dear friend Saziah shares why Prosser’s rant was more than something to be dismissed and filed under “trolls will be trolls”, or put down to a pathetic political attention grab by an increasingly irrelevant party, and instead a painfully personal attack – while perhaps not new, not to be dismissed.

I will tell you why, personally, this is yet another slap in the face. For me, politics is always personal. But this hits home. It hurts me in the same way it hurt me when, post 9/11, some stranger in a West Auckland supermarket had the audacity to walk up to my mother and tell her to go back where she came from because she wasn’t welcome here, simply because she was wearing a head scarf. It hurts in same way it hurt me when my younger brother came home from his part-time job one day in a North Shore mall, having dealt with a customer who, in response to my brother’s generic offer of assistance, said he didn’t need any help from the likes of him, who were “coming here” and “taking all the jobs.”

This isn’t to say anything of the years of name calling as children and “harmless joking around” as adults we’ve had to put up with. Yes, yes it’s hilarious when someone lumps all Bangladeshis together with Indians and Pakistanis and Sri Lankans and, in my case, a few times “Africans” (because, don’t you know, Africa is a country).

It goes beyond the exhaustion of having to detail my ethnic origin and travel history to every person who asks, and they do ask, all the fucking time. I don’t usually have a problem telling you I am originally from Bangladesh, I am proud to be Bengali, or why I don’t have an accent, or why I speak English well. Of course I give them the polite, quick version “oh my parents moved around a lot when I was a kid” instead of “I wasn’t born in Bangladesh and I have never lived there, I am a New Zealand citizen and of course I can speak English, I have a fucking Masters degree in Law for fuck’s sake” because, really, I JUST want to pay for my chocolate bar and leave your shop. And look, now the chocolate bar has multiplied into several chocolate bars because of the stress you’ve caused me. So, really, kudos on the ingenious sales strategy.

But fatigue from that sort of borderline offensive, often “harmless” curiousity I can handle.

This hurts particularly because, on an official level, it goes to the heart of the question of my identity.

Richard Posser’s suggestion that Muslim men of a certain age not be allowed on Western planes is offensive, blatantly racist and, let’s face it, ludicrous. There is no doubt about that. But Mr Posser’s comments hurt me personally because he is challenging who I am.

I am a Bengali New Zealander. I am also a feminist, a bookworm, a foodie and a cinephile. Some days I have good taste in music and some days I have bad taste in music. I love the beach but hate getting sand everywhere. I speak several languages. I still get upset at the thought that Dumbledore dies. When I lived in Auckland, I thought of West Auckland as home. Now that I live in Wellington, I think of Auckland as home, and of Wellington as “my city,” whatever that means. I bake decent brownies (oh the irony).

Oh, yes, I am also a Muslim.

You would think that would be the only thing about me that would be relevant to this conversation. But it is not. We are a sum of all our parts. Reducing us to one characteristic, especially one that is viewed with a lot of prejudice and misunderstanding, dehumanizes us. It is destructive. It is destructive to our personhood, in your eyes. And it is destructive to my identity in my own eyes.

I am not a perfect creature, and I grapple with my own identity every day, much the same way most people, for various reasons do. Possibly more so because of added factors. What I don’t need is an MP telling me what I am or am not.

Richard Prosser’s comments hurt because he’s saying I’m not a real New Zealander. I am an Other. I am suspect because I don’t, undoubtedly, look like his daughters. My little brother, now 20, studying a Bachelor of Commerce, with his terribly cheesy sense of humour and his kind, kind heart, who loves his sports and protein shakes but who I will partly always think of as that bossy toddler with chubby cheeks, is for no other reason than because Mr Prosser, from his position of power and privilege says so, not enough of a New Zealander. Because of only one thing, out of the many things that he is, because he is Muslim. Not enough of a New Zealander to deserve the minimum modicum of respect one would expect from an MP when talking about one of the citizens of this country, simply based on his faith, and, let’s be honest, the colour of his skin. Not enough of a New Zealander to get on his Western planes.

I can’t begin to discuss the issues behind considering Muslims a homogenous group, of defining the term “Western” or even how comments like this create and solidify the language of “us and them.” It is a self fulfilling prophecy. In Othering us, you are causing us to consider ourselves the Other, thus creating an Other when previously there was none. How, in 2013, are we still grappling with basic orientalism? After all these decades, isn’t it actually shameful that Said’s words still remain relevant?

Have some Muslims committed acts of terrorism? Yes. Have some Christians? Yes. Have some white people? Why yes. And so on and so forth. Are all the complex geopolitical issues from which a lot of this sentiment stems so easily summed up as “Muslims bad, non Muslims good” – I would argue: fuck no.

More importantly, I shouldn’t have to explain myself. I shouldn’t have to question my identity as a routine Tuesday afternoon activity. I shouldn’t be made to feel like a second-class citizen, not simply because I am not, but because such a thing should never exist, because if there is a hierarchy, a differentiation between citizens in that way, our personhood in the eyes of the State loses all meaning. Citizenship loses all meaning.

To allow MPs to spout that form of rhetoric unchecked makes us complicit in this concept of second-class citizenship. And it kills me that that means I am part of the system that is dehumanizing me. An MP who doesn’t understand that the legitimacy of his role and the power it entails derives from the people of this country, and that I AM the people of this country, my Muslim brother is, my Muslim friends are, my Muslim parents are, that MP can never understand that his position is not simply a platform to mouth off but an office bound by duty to the people, like me, from whence his power comes.

It makes me angry that MPs have such little appreciation for their role, that they would abuse it in this manner. All we’ll get from politicans on this is a lot of political posturing to their own ends. All we’ll get from the media on this is some blasé reporting, no critique that wouldn’t fit into a nifty little soundbyte that would retain consumer interest, no critical analysis, not one mention of the word “Islamophobia.”

I was hurt, and I needed to get this out. It is not an intellectual or academic piece of writing on rights and power politics, I didn’t go into immigration or multiculturalism or geopolitics or counterterrorism or traverse the topic of race in any meaningful way. Incidentally, one could argue, if anything, only making statements after carefully taking all such relevant issues into consideration actually IS Mr Prosser’s job. But this is a snapshot of how just another passing instance of racism, which will no doubt fade away in everyone else’s memories by tomorrow, made me question something as fundamental as my being here, in New Zealand, in my very own home. And I can assure you I’m not the only one.

For all the difference it makes I might as well have banged my head against my desk and left it at that. I should have left it at “No, Mr Prosser, YOU are a troglodyte.” I should have just left it at grrrr. Arrrggh.

deadrightkev

Chuck Bird

I have no idea – do you know of statistics that indicate what it could be?

As far as I’m aware our immigration selection criteria does not include or exclude based on religion. I don’t think we have a Muslim quota, nor a Jew quota, a Christian quota or an Atheist quota.

As DG pointed out Oz has double the percentage of Muslims. They are different than ethnic groups who have come here. Just about all intermarry and their children consider themselves to be New Zealanders. Some of underground bombers in London were second or third generation British but their loyal was to a religion that worship a long dead murdering paedophile.

There does not have to be any statistics. You just have to look at their birth rate and look at the percentage of refuges including the 150 from Oz that will be almost all Muslim. Then add family reunification. I would say in 10 years the percentage would be 2% like Oz is now. That may not worry you but it worries me and plenty of others.

“Muslim women only” times at local swimming pools
They have pool and time restrictions for children, they have pensioner sessions, lane swimming sessions, diving restrictions, swimming club use, competitions with school and age and sex restrictions. In fact all competitions that I’ve never been able to participate in because I’m a crap swimmer.
Should we be worried about all those?

As I said I am worried along with many others. They send their girls to school and do not want them to dress like the other kids as they believe western girls and woman be they European, Maori, PI or Chinese are sluts because of the way they dress.

Prosser may have used a few words that were not that smart but he can see a problem many liberals cannot.

When the Muslim Labour MP a few years back said he did not mind Muslins overseas killing homosexuals it certainly did not get the coverage and Labour certainly did not discipline him.

I am afraid PG that you and other liberals who are happy to commit cultural suicide are more of a worry than Prosser.